


The Sussex Downs

by Carice



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Episode: s04e03 The Final Problem, Post-The Final Problem
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-04
Updated: 2017-03-04
Packaged: 2018-09-28 07:33:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10079648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carice/pseuds/Carice
Summary: My take on life for Sherlock and Molly post The Final Problem. This is how I think Molly gets her happy ever after. She doesn't get what many people would consider to be 'normal'....but she doesn't want that. She could have had that any time. She wants Sherlock.





	

**Author's Note:**

> First ever go at fan fic, so do be kind! I have loved ALL the fan fic I have read about Sherlock and Molly. All of it. But I have difficulty seeing him settle down in the conventional way so I wrote my personal take on the aftermath of 'I love you'. oh and I think I have to say that of course none of these characters belong to me and all credit to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Moffat and Gatiss and the BBC! Mistakes of course are mine alone.

Coming back into London, John and Sherlock had passed a mostly silent, exhausted journey. Both had slept, somewhat to their surprise, having thought that the trauma of that day's events would have made sleep impossible. As they neared John's place, Sherlock took a look at his swollen, cut hands, testing them out with a little flexing movement, and drawing his breath in sharply as a result. John indicated his flat with a nod to his right. 

"Come in and I'll sort those cuts out for you. You can't sleep at 221b, anyway". 

Sherlock gave John a quick smile, then looked straight ahead. "I have to go to talk to Molly. But thanks John." 

The two men looked at each other for a moment. Parting company at this moment suddenly felt strange, after the life altering and profound trauma they had experienced together.  
John turned to look straight at Sherlock. "Good luck with Molly. Personally I think you might get a better reception if you leave it until tomorrow morning, it's very late. Why not stay here and go tomorrow?"

Sherlock shook his head, not considering that option for a second. "I must see her, John."

The vulnerability on Sherlock's face shook John. Sherlock was having to press his lips together to stop them wobbling. 

"Well. Good luck. Just - don't be a cock, ok?" John made to get out, then a thought stopped him. "Sherlock, if things don't go well - and I know how hard things have been today - please don't take anything. Just come to my place. Please". 

John half expected an exasperated, irritated response from Sherlock, but perhaps it was a 'new', post-Sherrinford Sherlock, or perhaps he was just unutterably exhausted, too exhausted to fight; Sherlock just said "Don't worry John. I have no intention of taking anything. If Molly chucks me out I'll come back here. Thanks". 

Sherlock had no coherent plan when he arrived at Molly's door. He just felt strongly that it would be very wrong of him not to see her at this earliest possible chance. When she answered the door, (What time was it, even? Sherlock had no idea. She was in pyjamas, though, and he'd clearly woken her up). 

Sherlock opened his mouth to talk, but no words came. Molly looked up at him, wounded and wary, but when she caught sight of his swollen and bloodied hands, she gently caught one in both of hers, and looked up at him again, quietly guiding him to come in. She padded to the kitchen area of her flat and it gave Sherlock a lurch in the stomach, like a punch, when he got a mind flash of the last time he had seen her in this kitchen and the sickening drop he had experienced in his guts when he thought she would hang up on him and that would be the end of her. Molly reached up to a top cupboard to get out a small first aid kit, and Sherlock stood behind her, admiring the way her pyjama bottoms, and her little t-shirt (he didn't know what to call it exactly, but liked it's tiny thin straps), clung to her skin. He realised how tiny she was, how dainty her figure was. Out of her layers of eccentric clothing and her lab coats she seemed smaller and more vulnerable and he felt an extra stab of disgust at himself for putting her in any danger. 

Molly sat them both down on the bar stools at the side of the worktop. As she began to clean up his hands, looking down at them all the time, she said "By the way Sherlock, Mycroft called me and explained some of what happened earlier. He explained why you called and why you said what you did. It's ok. I understand." 

Molly finished up with cleaning his hands, and sprayed on some antiseptic spray. She busied herself applying dressings to the worst of the wounds, giving Sherlock quick instructions to move his hands this way or that. Quickly, she hopped up from her stool and turned away to dispose of the odd bits of paper from the dressings, then suddenly she had turned to face Sherlock again, putting her hand on his upper arm. 

"Honestly, Sherlock. It is ok. I don't want you to go around thinking I hate you or anything. We'll get past it. It just might take me a while to get back to normal is all". Sherlock couldn't stand to see her bravely resigned face. She was so accustomed to being hurt by him that she thought she could deal with this too. Another stab of self loathing hit him. As she went to move away, he caught her arm. Somehow, he began to talk. About how he didn't have a plan, and he didn't even have the faintest idea of a direction that he wanted this to go in. About how he just needed Molly to know that he hadn't been using her. About how he knew for sure that he did love her. About how, without the act of having to say it, he would probably have always suppressed it, suppressed that side of himself, but now he had said it. And the very act of saying it had opened it up within him. About how there could be no more high functioning sociopath. He wasn't a sociopath at all. He was just a kid who had buried a trauma. His whole life up until now had been an exercise in hiding to protect everyone he loved, and himself. 

Molly had listened to him. She was absolutely still, but he could tell she was not doubting him. He moved his arm from holding hers, and ever so slowly and gently moved it around her waist, to pull her almost imperceptibly closer. As she moved, her turned on his stool to face her fully, and slowly, slowly, she moved towards him so that she was standing close, in between his legs. She reached up and gently stroked some of his hair back. Sherlock couldn't believe the effect of her touch. Every nerve end was alive to it, and he closed his eyes, drawing in a raw breath. His arms went around her waist, pulling her really into him now, and his eyes were open, searching her face, unsure. Then the relief of realising she was leaning up toward him, and he caught her up and their mouths met and she responded to his desperate kiss. It was another explosion of emotional honesty for him, like earlier when he had broken the coffin, Molly's coffin, with his bare hands. Now he was using his mouth, his hands, his body to tell Molly, to try to explain better than in words how much he needed her, how much he loved her. 

It was Molly who broke away first. She was so beautiful. Her lips were red and swollen from their bruising kisses. She was breathing heavily. After a moment, she stroked one hand on his cheek and shook her head slightly. 

"Sherlock, you're as white as a sheet". 

"I can't deny that I am feeling a bit - dizzy. But I don't care. I just - you had to know how I feel. I can't bear you to think I didn't mean what I said". 

Molly put her hands on his thighs. She was still standing in between his legs. 

"Much as I'm enjoying - very much enjoying - this, Sherlock, I think you need to get down from this stool and properly sit down before you fall down. I'm worried you might keel over. You're clearly exhausted and traumatised and I don't want to - erm, take advantage of you in this state". She gave a flash of one of her big, sweet smiles. 

Sherlock knew she was right and was feeling slightly that he was out of his own body right then, but he was also male, and had not wanted to stop kissing this amazing, sexy woman. His body had come alive along with his emotions today and he felt a little wild right now, like it would be hard to rein himself in. He pulled her to him then, making sure she could feel his rock-hardness for her, trying to kiss her again, but she (adorably) giggled and pulled away again. She was flushed and smiling. He was glad, but at the same time as he felt super high, his out of control emotions were all over the place and he was just as much in despair as to what on earth he would do with all this. Surely, there was no one more ill equipped to make this sweet woman happy.

He allowed her to move him to the sofa, and he lay out along it, pulling her to sit beside him, facing him. His voice was raw and exhausted but he couldn't stop talking again now, telling her he loved her but reminding her he had no plan, no road map. He would be a terrible, terrible life partner. His very job put her at risk. How long before the next criminal came along and tried to harm her, knowing that she was his? It would be putting her in the firing line on a daily basis. He knew he was a selfish bastard. Being able to acknowledge his love for her and knowing that he was a victim of childhood trauma changed things, but it wouldn't change him completely. He would forget important dates. He was repulsed by the expectations of being a 'boyfriend' - dinners and candles and all that claptrap. He was likely to offend and say things he shouldn't. He would disappear for days or weeks on cases, or even if physically there he would be mentally absent. He simply wasn't made for a house and marriage and kids. 

As he said this last thing, Molly stood up suddenly. He sat up, suddenly afraid that he'd been too honest. His heart sank and he groaned inwardly. He had managed to muck this up already and create a worse, more emotionally damaging day than he even needed to. 

Molly had moved across to look out of her front window, and when she turned back to him, her eyes were flashing with tears and anger all at once. 

"Sherlock, don't patronise me! I know you, remember? I've known you a long time, now. And I thought you knew me a little better. Don't make me into some parody of myself. I know you don't have a normal job, or a normal life. I know you, and I still love you! If I wanted 'normal', don't you think I could have had it? I would have stayed with Tom. Or anyone. I don't care about a house, or marriage, or even kids. I love you. I want you." She stood in front of him, shrugging her shoulders. "I love YOU". 

Sherlock grabbed her and she fell towards him, and they hugged, Molly's tears wetting his shirt. Sherlock apologised endlessly. Explained again and again that he just couldn't bear to make her life worse, to stop her having anything she could have in life. To stop her having a child? He pulled out of the hug, to search her face closely. 

Molly looked him square in the face again, through her tears. "If I wanted that, Sherlock, I would have had that. I faced my thoughts on that when I split with Tom. You and me, we're lucky. We'll always have Rosie. She needs us more than most godparents are needed. And we have an important job to do in making sure she grows up knowing Mary. I don't have a massive plan about children or a child of my own. I never have had. I don't have all the answers. The one thing I know is that I love you."

Sherlock was kissing her again. Kissing her mouth, her neck. He didn't deserve this woman.

"I love you so much that I don't want you to change, Sherlock. Get 221b back to rights. Solve crimes with John. And with me, sometimes....when I have time. Outwardly not so much will have changed - your beloved psychopaths won't necessarily target me. And I'm sure Mycroft will be forthcoming with a bit of his - surveillance, if requested. And you can come and see me, and I will come and see you....when we want to" Molly (feeling emboldened) was tracing a naughty finger up one of Sherlock's thighs as she spoke. "And now and then, we'll get away together, when everything else has got too much and we need some time. Did you know Mrs Hudson has a little cottage on the Sussex Downs?" Sherlock shook his head, kissing Molly between words. "Who knew she was so rich?" Molly went on. Sherlock was all hands now - his hands were on her arms, in her hair, pulling off those little straps, inside her top, on her breasts. Both their breathing was loud and ragged now. "Who knows, Sherlock? Crime fighting is a young man's game.....maybe one day, you'll retire there." Sherlock, breaking away from Molly for a second, smiled the truth of that assertion - he wasn't as young as he used to be."And maybe you'll find me there...we'll make a room into a lab and do mad experiments together. And there'll be beehives in the garden. I've always wanted to keep bees......"


End file.
